Wednesday, March 28, 2007

For ethics gaffes, most editors are scolding staff

A majority of editors are scolding their employees and shuffling jobs to address ethical faux pas, according to an ongoing survey of ASNE members by the Missouri School of Journalism.

Nearly 72 percent of those who completed the online poll said they had reprimanded reporters and editors in the past year. And 63 percent reported making personnel changes as well.

Those staffers are not able or willing to question their assumptions, one editor wrote in the anonymous survey.

"It's a nightmare because it's not an event, but rather a state of being," the editor wrote.

But the respondents said they weren't leaving readers in the dark. Of the respondents, 87 percent said they had explained an ethics-related decision in the past year. And a fifth said they had to do so more than six times in the same period.

The survey, run by school’s Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute, can still be completed here.

The institute is hosting a reception tomorrow from 5 to 6:30 in the Russell/Hart Rooms.